Heinrich Franz Carl Billotte

Heinrich Franz Carl Billotte

Heinrich Franz Carl Billotte (born January 28, 1801 in Aachen , † April 25, 1892 there ) was a German portrait painter of the 19th century .

Life

The son of the tapestry maker Claude Billotte, born around 1745 in Metz , France, and Anne Elisabeth Bonn (* around 1765) from Aachen. lost both parents in 1807 at the age of six within a month and then grew up with his mother's relatives in Aachen, then France. Billotte initially became a confectioner like his foster father and in 1826 his first marriage was the seamstress Johanna Theresia Dechamps from Hodimont .

Drawing was his favorite pastime even in his youth and he used every opportunity during his apprenticeship and journeyman time to be artistically active. It is therefore possible to assume that he had a self-taught beginnings before he attended the drawing school of the David student Johann Baptist Joseph Bastiné in Aachen around 1824 . He refined his knowledge of drawing, painting and modeling and worked as a drawing teacher himself in 1828/29. Billotte also attended the Düsseldorf Art Academy for further studies . In addition, he took on other work as a restorer , wallpaper painter , decorative painter , glass painter and sign maker.

His son from his first marriage, Egidius Franz Carl Billotte (* 1828), also initially worked as a painter, but later turned more and more to photography. In his company "Photographie artistique" in Brussels he used the method "Photographie au charbon inhaltérable", a special fine printing process . He made a traditional portrait of a woman around 1865. The son of Heinrich Billotte's second marriage with Maria Gertrud Coonen, Carl Andreas Hubert Billotte (1838–1917), settled in Aachen as a photographer. Heinrich Billotte created his portraits and colored photographs in coproduction with the photographic studio of his son Carl .

Works

Billotte's early work, a portrait of his wife Johanna, is a Romantic and Biedermeier painting. He remained true to this style throughout his life. He idealized the faces of those portrayed according to the conventions of Biedermeier. Around 1830 he painted his version of a " Sappho " in the style of the Düsseldorf School of Painting .

Billotte made his oil paintings both in portrait sessions and from photographs of his son Carl. The method of painting from photographs was quite common in the 19th century from 1843 onwards. They were commissioned pictures in his own style and the style of the time. Billotte's oeuvre combined different styles of his era: elements of Romanticism, Nazarenes , Biedermeier and late Romanticism. In the late summer of 1837 Billotte took part in the first Aachen painting exhibition by contemporary artists in Aachen City Hall . His most important works are the portraits of the Aachen print manufacturer Henry Joseph Napoléon Lambertz and his wife Pauline. With these counterparts from 1878, Billotte cemented his reputation as a portrait painter.

His repertoire as an artist includes colored photographs, landscape pictures , still lifes , image copies and lithographs . In addition to the portraits, his oeuvre includes a portrait of his own family. In this family picture he repeats the portrait of his first wife Johanna as picture in picture. This is how Billotte introduced his entire family in this painting.

The signature

With his signature , the artist provided the handwritten portrait of himself. Billotte put a ligature in the signature of his paintings . He designed his monogram from the first letters of his three first names. The right vertical line of the H became the stem of the letter F, with the crossbar of the H playing a major role. Billotte let the crossbar go from H to F. He anchored the C on the beam with the counterpart of the running horizontal line of the F. The monogram is followed by his last name, a point and in the middle under the signature the year.

style

Heinrich Franz Carl Billotte advanced to become one of the most important portrait painters of the 19th century in Aachen after Bastiné. His repertoire as an artist includes portraits, landscapes and still lifes. His art skills are painting, the symbiosis of painting and photography, image copies and lithographs.

As a portrait artist, he created his works in his own style and in the style of his time, romantic and late romantic . The artist HCF Billotte had a pronounced wealth of detail and vivid material illusions. Above all, he mastered correct anatomy. Dark and warm tones dominated his color palette. In the Lambertz portraits, purple and green are reminiscent of Goethe's theory of colors.

His painting “Sappho throws himself into the sea” documents his time at the academy. His symbiosis of painting and photography has handed down small rarities. He used the modern technique of photography as an underground sketch and preliminary studies of his portraits. His style includes hidden refinements: his ligature, the placement of his signature, his bi-oculus effect, his picturesque details, a smooth surface design and neutral backgrounds of his idealized portraits.

The portrait of Johanna Billotte forms the cornerstone of Billotte's Aachen Biedermeier style. Its local style reflects the location: between Paris and Düsseldorf . This work and his self-portrait at a young age mark the beginning of his career. At the age of around 30, Billotte had reached its artistic peak. It was possible for him to maintain his artistry throughout his life.

reception

Five years after his death, Johannes Fey wrote the short biography of the artist in 1897. In 1927 he appeared as a student of Bastiné in his homage with two works “The painter in the circle of his family” and a “self-portrait” alongside Alfred Rethel , Ludwig Schleiden , Friedrich Thomas and Aloys Hubert Michael Venth .

List of his works

• "Self-portrait" lit. handed down
• around 1828 “Johanna Billotte” portrait of his first wife
• around 1828 “The Aachen Minster.” Preliminary study, lost
• 1828 “The Aachen Minster.” Lost
• 1830 "Rossini" lit. handed down
• 1830 "Carl Weymar" lit. handed down
• around 1830 "Sappho throws himself into the sea" lost
• 1831 "Death mask of Mrs. Government Councilor Krüger", accompanying plaster model
• n. 1839 drawing "Stiftspropst Matthias Claessen"
• after 1835 flag of the secondary school "with the image of Charlemagne"
• around 1838 portrait of his children " Carl and Johanna"
• 1840 "self-portrait"
• 1850 "self-portrait"
• around 1840 "Gertrude Billotte" portrait of his second wife with a copy of Raphael's "Madonna della Sedia"
• around 1845 Portrait of Edmund Emundt (HCF Billotte)
• around 1847 Tondo with two child portraits (presumably daughters Billotte)
• 1852 "Oil sketch for a family picture"
• 1852 "Franz Billotte family"
• 1858 "Canon Franz AG Kloth"
• before 1866 chalk drawing "Descent from the Cross". Copy of the picture by Gerrit Honthorst .
• 1871 painting-photography "Maria Lambertz",
• 1876 ​​painting-photography "Pauline Lambertz"
• 1876? Painting-Photography "Henry Lambertz"
• 1877 "Louise Billotte" portrait of his daughter
• around 1878 rehearsal for "Pauline Lambertz"
• 1878 "Henry Lambertz"
• 1878 "Pauline Lambertz"
• around 1879 copy by A. Venth “St. Peter"
• 1881 small altarpiece "Maria mit Kind" (copy?) For a Johann Joseph Couven altarpiece in the Aachener Peterskirche
• undated "Still life grapes with peaches"
• undated Five drawings
• undated Lithograph "Johann Wilhelm Dilschneider"
• undated elderly lady with linen fichu

literature

• Johannes Fey: "On the history of Aachen painters of the 19th century." In: From Aachen's prehistory. Announcements from the association for customers of the Aachen prehistory . Tenth year 1897, No. 4/8. Pp. 70-72. Short biography of Billotte.
• Volker Frank: “Billotte, Franz (Heinrich Franz Carl)” in “General Artist Lexicon. The visual artists of all times and peoples. ”Ed. v. Günter Meissner. Saur, Munich, Leipzig, 1995.

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Whether the artists C. Billotte (French lithographer in Lille, 2 weeks 1842/44), E. Billotte (French? Miniature painter, 1850ff.), Léon-Joseph Billotte (1815-1886. Portrait painter: Empress Eugénie . ) And René Billotte (1846 Tarbes in Hautes-Pyrénées in Frkr -1915 Paris; landscape painter. Works in oil and pastel. Example of his works of art. ) Descend from the same Billotte line is questionable. “General artist lexicon. The visual artists of all times and peoples. ”Ed. v. Günter Meissner. Saur, Munich, Leipzig, 1995. (AKL).
2. ↑ Fey, p. 70; LAV 89/1826;
3. ↑ ^{a b c} Fey, p. 71.
4. ↑ LAV 5211/1828; 397/1829;
5. ↑ Fey, pp. 71f.
6. ↑ Fig. No .: 177: "View of the Aachen Cathedral from the East", stolen on February 18, 1988 from the Museum Burg Frankenberg
7. ↑ Bild-.Nr.:176: "Sappho throws himself into the sea".
8. ↑ Still life “Grapes with Peaches” ( Memento of the original from January 20, 2016 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link has been inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.